Disclaimer: Twilight Saga doesn't belong to me, but this version of VampWard is all mine. ;)

A/N: All your reviews for the last chapter have made me smile like crazy. I would like to thank every one of you, who has reviewed, favorited, put on alert or simply... read RoALS. You guys make it worth my time to put my crazy thoughts in writing. Thank you.

A special thanks to my granma, DataByteDL-FangirlinGranma, for her unyielding support to me. Love you unconditionally, Granma. xo

Ready for the next chapter? Read on!

Chapter-5: Empty Playground

BPOV

After driving past the Forks' Diner—which seemed like the only diner in the town, by the way—for the fourth time, I figured that I should probably call Jenks.

I was supposed to call him after I had crossed the town border, but the weird-sexy guy I met had made me forget all about old-slightly-balding J. Jenks.

Pulling my patched-up phone out, I dialed the number for my attorney.

"Jay here," answered the scratchy voice of the one and only Jenks as soon as the call connected.

"Hi, it's Bella …"

Before I could finish my sentence he greeted me boisterously. "Isabella! My dear, how are you?"

I bit my lip before phrasing my problem carefully. "Yeah … how I am actually is relevant to how soon you can come meet me at the Forks' Diner."

"What was that?" He sounded confused by my brilliant hinting.

Really? Now I need to spell it out for you? Fine.

"Um … I … uh," I waited for some other brilliant idea to come and swoop in to spare me the embarrassment, but it seemed like I had left all my bright ideas at Phoenix.

All right then.

"I'm in Forks now and I kinda got lost," I said bluntly.

"Kind of lost?"

"Yes," I replied with a nod before remembering that he couldn't see me. "I think I drove by the diner four times already."

He laughed and said sympathetically, "I guess it's going to be different for you getting used to the small-town life after growing up in a big city."

I hummed in a non-committal manner, not wanting to get distracted from the fact that I was still lost. "Can you help me please?"

My request seemed to jolt him out of whatever he was going to say. "Sorry, my dear, I can't," he sounded pretty regretful as he replied to me. "I live in Port Angeles and I'm about to meet another client of mine."

"Oh! Well, I think I can find some way to get to the house then," I said, trying not to sound too bummed out.

He was quiet for a moment before asking me, "Where exactly are you?"

"I'm sitting in the car, parked right outside the diner. Why?"

His answer was quick this time. "All right. You stay right there and I'll see what I can do for you. I'll call you back in a few minutes."

After a hasty goodbye, he hung up, leaving me to sit there alone and watch people going in and out of the diner.

Three minutes later, my phone rings.

"Hello?"

"Good news, dear. I managed to get hold of one of my people in Forks," he said, sounding relieved. "He's heading out to get you right now."

"He knows where the house is?" I asked, wanting to be certain.

Jenks laughed in response. "Bella, your father was the chief of police in that town. Of course everyone knows where your house is."

"Okay," I mumbled. "Thanks, Jay."

"Anytime," he replied kindly. "I hope you get settled in easily."

I thanked him once more before hanging up.

As I sat there, outside the shabby little diner, my mind went back to the man I had found lying in the middle of the road. So many questions were running through my mind …

Who was he?

What was he doing there in the middle of the road?

What's his name?

Why did he take off like that?

I closed my eyes and tried to remember exactly what he looked like. He was tall; not heavily built, but definitely fit. In the rays from the street light, his hair looked brownish. He didn't seem older than me, but something in his eyes made me think of him as a man and not a boy.

Oh God, his eyes!

They were the most vibrant shade of green, and the way he had looked at me made me feel like he was trying to look into my soul or something.

Tap … tap … tap …

The sound of someone tapping on my window made me push the thought of my handsome stranger out of my mind and look out the window.

A middle-aged man stood there with a smile on his face.

This must be Jenks' guy, I thought as I opened the window for him.

"Isabella?" he asked before I could ask him who he was.

"Yes …"

His smile broadened as he said, "Look at you! You're all grown up! The last time I saw you, you were barely a year old. You grew up to look just like your ma."

I felt my eyebrows pull together in confusion. "You knew my parents?"

He nodded. "Yes, I did. Your dad was my best friend," he said sadly. Then he looked at me and tried to smile. "I'm Billy Black. I got a call from Jenks saying that you couldn't find the way home."

I returned his smile and held my hand out through the window. "It's nice to meet you, Mr. Black."

He shook it and then said, "Please call me Billy."

"Billy," I repeated with a nod. "Can you please show me the way?"

"It's been a long time since I went to the house, but I think I can find it," he responded and then got in the passenger side.

~*~*~*RoALS*~*~*~

When we pulled up to the little white house, I felt something tug at my heart.

This was the house I was born in.

This is where my parents lived.

The sound of the car door closing made me look away from the now shabby-looking house and see Billy already walking toward my door.

I got out of the car and motioned to the house standing before us. "Is this it?"

Billy nodded, looking grim. "It is. It was such a beautiful house back when your folks bought it!" he said sadly. "It was a house full of love."

Hearing him say stuff like that didn't help with the sting at the back of my eyes. I blinked a few times, trying to keep the tears threatening to spill at bay.

You didn't know them, Bella. You can't miss someone you didn't know, I kept telling myself.

"Isabella, you're here!" A woman in her early twenties greeted me enthusiastically as she stood up from the porch swing.

I frowned and started to ask who she was when Billy answered my unasked question. "This is my daughter, Rachel. She's here to help you settle in."

Rachel walked down the steps and pulled me into a hug as she said, "Welcome home, Isabella."

Something about her overly-friendly way made me feel uneasy, and I carefully extracted myself from her forced embrace. I held my hand out to her instead. "It's nice to meet you."

She waved my hand away and said, "Oh honey, we're practically family. You don't shake hands with your family, you hug them."

"O-kay?" my answer came out as a question because I honestly didn't feel like we were like family in any way.

As the father-daughter duo ushered me up the stairs leading to the front porch of my parents' house, I stopped.

This is going to be the first time I step inside this house, I thought to myself. Do I really want strangers present with me for this moment?

The answer was simple—no, I didn't.

Turning around to face the welcoming—if not overly so—and seemingly good-hearted strangers, I tried to smile at them. "Billy, Rachel, thank you for bringing me here," I said politely. "I think I'll be able to manage by myself just fine from here."

"But …" Rachel started to say but I put on a determined face and continued, "Really, I've had a long journey today. I don't think I'll be good company right now."

Translation: please leave me alone right now.

Thankfully, Billy seemed to understand my point. He put a hand on his daughter's arm and said, "Rach, honey, let's give Isabella some time to process being back to her home. Shall we?"

Rachel pouted slightly and said, "But Jenks said I'm supposed to keep her company!"

"I'm fine, honestly," I said, not really feeling up to company at the moment. When she looked at me sadly, I added, "Maybe we can hang out tomorrow?"

She looked appeased by my words at last and nodded excitedly with a smile on her face.

With a final over-the-top-friendly hug and wave sent in my way, she left with her father, granting me the solitude I wanted.

Once I was alone, I pulled out the set of keys Jenks had given me when he visited me in Arizona and set out to wrestle with the rusty old lock on the front door.

~*~*~*RoALS*~*~*~

The moment I entered the house where my parents used to live, I regretted not taking Angela up on her offer to accompany me. For the first time since Jenks told me about my parents, I felt sadness creep up on me.

The front door opened to a fairly spacious living room. Closing the door behind me, I walked into the room and immediately felt the breath leave my lungs.

There—hanging from the wall—were various pictures of the same two people Jenks had shown me … my parents. I saw their wedding picture in the middle right next to another one with the man who must be my father with Billy Black.

So they were friends.

It's at that moment when the photo beside the wedding picture captured my notice. It was a photo of the same couple with a little bundle of pink in their arms. I stepped closer to the photograph and wiped away the layers of dust from the frame.

Once the dust was cleared off, I could see the matching looks of adoration on their faces as they looked down at the baby in their arms. And the child? She was looking intently at her parents while clutching one of her daddy's fingers in her tightly fisted hand.

Underneath the photo a small handwritten note could be seen. It said, "The Swan Family: Charlie, Reneé and our beautiful baby girl, Isabella Swan."

A gasp escaped my mouth as I saw the script. It means they really did love me!

As I looked around the house and noticed the peeling wallpapers, the dust covered surfaces and the plastic covered furniture. The more I looked, the more I wished I had had the chance to know them.

I started to feel tears threatening to spill from my eyes and so before going up the stairs, I decided to check out the backyard. I needed to go somewhere without the possibilities of telling me that this was a home filled with love once.

However, the moment I stepped through the kitchen door to the backyard, I knew that I was wrong.

The backyard was full of weeds and tall grasses but there was also a little fenced area that might have been a vegetable patch—somewhere Reneé Swan might have spent her evenings working.

A few feet away from the vegetable patch was another boxed-off area filled with mud and dirt. This could've been a sandbox … for a child. For me, maybe?

I walked up to the could-be sandbox and looked around, trying to remember something, anything from here. As I walked around it, my foot caught on something and I looked down to see what it was.

A toy car … a police cruiser to be exact.

I remembered Billy saying that my father used to be the Police chief in this town. So maybe he got be a police cruiser as a toy car?

A shocked sound left my lips … a sound between a choked gasp and a bark of laughter. Before I could be seen crying my eyes out in the open by the neighbors, I ran inside the house.

I couldn't find it in me to venture up the stairs that night. So I decided to sleep in a less personalized guest bedroom next to the living room. I stripped off the dusty bed sheets and lay down on the mattress, hoping for sleep to claim me.

Lying there in the darkness, I let the tears escape at last. I knew I was gonna cry at some point so I guess it was better to let it out when I was alone.

Tomorrow is going to be a new day and I won't let things get to me again, I promised to myself as I felt the much awaited sleep pull be under.

EPOV

"Shit!" I cursed in frustration as I read the same line for the hundred and twenty sixth time. After my escape from the innocent and delicious-smelling girl, I had decided to go through one of my medical books in hopes of preparing myself for tomorrow.

Right, as if you can forget what you read a few years ago! You're a fucking vampire, Edward, I told myself.

Fine, if I was being honest with myself, I was trying to read to get her out of my mind—trying being the operative word here. Every damn time I tried to focus, her face kept popping up in my mind.

This was a different form of torture than the constant mind-reading, and I hated it. I hated it because I could see the question in her big brown eyes as she looked at my fleeing figure. I hated it because I could smell her undeniably exquisite scent in my hand from where she had touched me. I hated it because it made me want to go back to her … and not to kill her for a change.

Closing the book in my hand, I let it fall down to the floor. I couldn't get her out of my mind. Frustrated, I softly punched the wall beside me—careful not to leave a dent.

Of course my groan of frustration lured the persistent pain-in-the-ass girl who lived with me—Alice.

"I see you're back from your hunt," she said from the doorway, looking too fucking happy with herself.

"Alice …" I started as a warning, but she waved me off.

"Did you have a good time?"

I narrowed my eyes at her and asked suspiciously, "You told me to go far away from home because you knew that would make me go closer, didn't you?"

She batted her eyelashes, a telling way of saying that she was about to lie. "I have absolutely no idea what you're talking about."

"Right," I muttered sarcastically.

She waited for a half a heartbeat before letting go of the innocent façade and skipping up to sit on the bed, facing me.

"How was she?" Her eagerness was plain as the fucking day in her voice.

For a moment, I thought about feigning that I had no idea who she was talking about, but for some reason, I knew she'd make me spill my guts anyway. So I opted for nonchalance. "Human."

She rolled her eyes at my statement. "I already know that! Tell me more. Does she look pretty in real life? How does her voice sound? What did she say to you? Did she seem interested in you?"

I grimaced at her rapid-fire questions and said firmly, "Everything about her screamed one thing."

"Which is?" she asked with a satisfied grin as if I was going to profess my undying love for the human.

Talk about being ridiculous!

"Stay the fuck away from me, Edward Masen," I said firmly.

She pulled a face at me. "Language, big brother."

I raised an eyebrow at her and replied, "I seem to recall someone cussing up a storm when she was watching Moping with the Kardashians just last night."

She looked offended at my ribbing. "It's called Keeping up with the Kardashians, Edward. And of course I was cussing. It was like watching a train wreck happen."

I nodded. "That's pretty much what my life is, Alice."

She sobered up immediately and placed her hand on my head. "You're wrong, Edward. You'll see."

She waited for me to answer her, but when I kept resolutely quiet, she sighed and started to walk out of the room. Just before leaving, she turned and thought to me, You'll be a Cullen one day, brother. Trust me.

When it came to premonitions, I did trust my sister and that made her words even more scary.

A/N: I have absolutely nothing against the Kardashians. It's all Edward, I tell you! ;)

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Thanks for reading.

Song rec for this chapter: Night Changes by One Direction.

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Until next time.

Take care.

Ann